C R Hunt - Sep 27, 2010:

Chuck Bolin - Sep 27, 2010:

One thing for sure is if a computer program get’s very angry with us…and starts deleting every 3rd word in our emails…sending malicious emails from our accounts, or begins mass edits on our research docs…we’ll be able to hit the old “reset” button…and the program will once again adore us.  =)

I recently began reading Catch-22 and your comment seems particularly relevant to the first chapter. Perhaps boredom would be as dangerous as anger?

Suppose we are able to model emotions, and chatbot and robots find their way in the virtual/physical world autonomously. Their internal emotional state changes due to the interaction with the environment. Should we program that they need to avoid the negative emotional state and to strive for positive emotions?

And what triggers emotions? Some things are really inborn, like physical pain. Others are learned during life, like a good feeling related to a particular song (memories with positive emotions are triggered).

And if a robot should avoid the negative emotion state, what should he do with a human trying to hurt him?

Or, talking about empathy, what should he do with a human trying to hurt someone else.

And back to the chatbot world: what should he do with a human that verbally tries to insult someone else? If a chatbot is empathic, he’ll ‘feel’ the negative atmosphere, and as he wants to avoid the negative atmosphere, that’s how he is (hopefully) programmed, what will he do?